


not the waking

by SafelyCapricious



Series: things you find in a graveyard [19]
Category: Daredevil (TV), The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, F/M, Half-Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-24 14:31:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21101027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SafelyCapricious/pseuds/SafelyCapricious
Summary: Karen wakes up with Daniel dead beside her, mouth full of blood, and she has a split second of calm knowledge that her life will never be the same — and then it all goes to shit.It’s not until she’s fighting a cop for her life, and she cries out, “Stop!” and he does that she thinks something must have changed and then she tells him to let go of her, and he does that too — and when she tells him to leave and he does that…well.





	not the waking

**Author's Note:**

> Title generated by the [Hozier random fanfic title generator](http://www.generatorland.com/usergenerator.aspx?id=22501) and i want to marry that generator.
> 
> 61.29% DONE WITH FICTOBER KDLKDSDLKKDSL <strike>kill me</strike>
> 
> More Kastle, so I hope ya'll like that stuff.

Karen wakes up with Daniel dead beside her, mouth full of blood, and she has a split second of calm knowledge that her life will never be the same — and then it all goes to shit. 

It’s not until she’s fighting a cop for her life, and she cries out, “Stop!” and he does that she thinks something must have changed and then she tells him to let go of her, and he does that too — and when she tells him to leave and he does that…well. 

She’s thirsty, after, but she can’t think about that because she has lawyers now and they’re helping her and —

Here’s the thing, Karen has never been good at _not _thinking about things. But she’s not sure this is something she can answer on her own. Oh, she tries. She finds books to read and resources and — nothing is quite right. (She does, accidentally, end up addicted to an old HBO series that is definitely not accurate or similar to her experience at all, but it’s just so dramatic that she finds she has to keep watching it — and besides, she torrented the whole thing in the first place so she might as well finish, even if one of the later characters does look distressingly similar to her, if she were a red head.) 

There is one resource she doesn’t touch. She just can’t make herself pick up the phone and try to call and —

Her mother left when she was still a child. Karen could remember the yelling fights, and then worse, the tense silence that would permeate the house like a living thing. The last time she saw her mom was when the woman came back after Kevin’s near death experience. 

Which is to say, when Karen was sure he was dead because he wasn’t breathing and didn’t have a heartbeat but then he was and their mom had come and taken him and — 

She doesn’t think she’s died, like Kevin did. She still has a heartbeat and her ability to hold her breath is still fairly short. 

But.

But something happened and — 

“You will not hurt me,” she says to Wesley, and he blinks slowly at her before nodding. “You are going to take that gun, and you are going to leave here, and you are not going to speak to anyone about anything, and you are going to kill yourself.” 

He blinks again, and nods, and she’s so thirsty and — 

She goes to a diner immediately after. Something about coffee helps. And it’s a bad idea because it’s late at night and — she imagines she can hear the gunshot, when it goes off, like an alarm in the back of her head and she orders a burger as rare as they’re willing to make it. 

Her mother, she thinks as she chews through the, unfortunately, still mostly cooked patty, must have been full blooded. She wonders if that’s why she’d left her father or if there had been another disagreement and death had — she is probably lucky that death hadn’t just stolen Kevin from her. Even if they haven’t spoken since that night. 

And it’s fine. It’s fine and she can keep herself safe which, apparently, is becoming harder and harder to do in this city. 

The next day she can’t help but smile at the note in the paper about Wesley’s suicide.

Some part of her mind rebells that she was the one who killed him, even if she didn’t pull the trigger, but — 

But then Urich is dead anyways and she really doesn’t have it in herself to care and she’s _glad_ that they’re going to put Fisk away. 

She may be a monster — or at least half of one — but she’s more human than him. 

She tries not to use her powers, as time progresses, she gets better at open ended questions to keep people from being forced to follow her whims and — Coffee continues to help. And if anyone is surprised by her sudden affection for steak tartare or very rare meat they don’t comment to her about it. It helps. 

So she doesn’t try to use what she privately thinks of as her power on Frank Castle until he’s standing in her apartment and she tells him to stay where he is and that he isn’t allowed to touch her and to put his hands on his head and — 

He puts his hands on his head, it’s true, but he takes another step towards her and she’s opening her mouth to tell him more forcefully when he’s got her pinned and — 

“Let me go,” she says, and he blinks at her and offers her a frown and doesn’t. Oh, his hand flexes like he’s thinking about it, but she thinks that might be more down to his chivalry than anything else. 

“How,” she asks later, half in disbelief as the waitress doesn’t realize who he is, and too shocked and tired to care what she’s saying, “can you resist?” 

“Ma’am?” he asks, with a crooked grin as his gaze darts back out the window again and she makes a face at herself and drinks more coffee. 

“Shut up,” she says, half heartedly, and as expected he doesn’t. But he shuts up, finally, when she laughs at him and tells him that Matt doesn’t love her — that Matt wants her to be someone she’s not. And when he asks how she knows, she can only shrug and tell him that Matt told her himself — which he did — even if she can’t explain why since it sounds insane and it doesn’t even work on him.

But it’s kind of nice to not have to worry about what she’s saying and to not worry that she’s influencing someone without meaning to and taking advantage. Or, at least, it’s nice until they get attacked and everything goes to hell in a hand-basket quickly.

And then — well — it might be cheating to ask someone questions they can’t help but answer, but despite his military past, Schoonover can’t resist the way Frank can. And she takes some advantage and then she takes more advantage and then Frank is there. 

And she can’t even be surprised when he explodes in fur and fury — even if he won’t listen to her urging to wait, just wait, so she can find out more but — it’s too late and it’s going to be terrible to try to find someone else who knows so she can ask more questions and — 

She hits him, on the shoulder, and tells him he’s an idiot. 

And he growls, because he apparently can’t talk when he’s the monstrous beast thing that the military apparently turned him into. 

And she swears and about four hours later they’re sitting across from each other, like déjà vu, in a diner as they both eat the bloodiest thing on the menu and down coffee like it’s a race. 

“You think that’s it?” she asks him, thirst faded enough that she can focus again, as she picks at a few fries leftover on her plate. “You think he was the only snake you had to behead?” 

And he glowers at her, not quite non-verbal anymore, but still more surly than usual. 

“I can help you,” she says, earnest, leaning forward to force him to meet her eyes, “I can help you and I want to, so why won’t you take the help, Frank?” 

He nods, terse, and takes another long pull of coffee, and she sits back, satisfied in a way she can’t explain. 

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me [on tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/capriciouswrites), I love when people talk to me.
> 
> No beta's we die like men -- please let me know what you thought! <strike>oh dear god what am i doing why am i doing fictober why does this continue whhhhhhy</strike>
> 
> This is literally what I had on the last fic, but it's still true so I'm keeping it all.
> 
> Talk to me, I love you.


End file.
